It's Chrissstmasssss!!

On the first day of Christmas, 
my true love sent to me 
A Kiwi in a pine tree. 

On the second day of Christmas, 
my true love sent to me 
Two bungy jumps, 
And a Kiwi in a pine tree. 

On the third day of Christmas, 
my true love sent to me 
Three hour bus, 
Two bungy jumps, 
And a Kiwi in a pine tree. 

On the fourth day of Christmas, 
my true love sent to me 
Four Cadbury Fountains, 
Three hour bus, 
Two bungy jumps, 
And a Kiwi in a pine tree.  

On the fifth day of Christmas, 
my true love sent to me 
Five penguins, 
Four Cadbury Fountains, 
Three hour bus, 
Two bungy jumps, 
And a Kiwi in a pine tree.

On the sixth day of Christmas, 
my true love sent to me 
Six dusky dolphins, 
Five penguins, 
Four Cadbury Fountains, 
Three hour bus, 
Two bungy jumps, 
And a Kiwi in a pine tree. 

On the seventh day of Christmas, 
my true love sent to me 
Seven sleeping mates, 
Six dusky dolphins, 
Five penguins, 
Four Cadbury Fountains, 
Three hour bus, 
Two bungy jumps, 
And a Kiwi in a pine tree.  

On the eighth day of Christmas, 
my true love sent to me 
Eight Kiwi Pies, 
Seven sleeping mates, 
Six dusky dolphins, 
Five penguins, 
Four Cadbury Fountains, 
Three hour bus, 
Two bungy jumps, 
And a Kiwi in a pine tree.  

On the ninth day of Christmas, 
my true love sent to me 
Nine crazy kids, 
Eight Kiwi Pies, 
Seven sleeping mates, 
Six dusky dolphins, 
Five penguins, 
Four Cadbury Fountains, 
Three hour bus, 
Two bungy jumps, 
And a Kiwi in a pine tree. 

On the tenth day of Christmas, 
my true love sent to me 
Ten Christmas parcels, 
Nine crazy kids, 
Eight Kiwi Pies, 
Seven sleeping mates, 
Six dusky dolphins, 
Five penguins, 
Four Cadbury Fountains, 
Three hour bus, 
Two bungy jumps, 
And a Kiwi in a pine tree. 

On the eleventh day of Christmas, 
my true love sent to me 
Eleven sunny hours, 
Ten Christmas parcels, 
Nine crazy kids, 
Eight Kiwi Pies, 
Seven sleeping mates, 
Six dusky dolphins, 
Five penguins, 
Four Cadbury Fountains, 
Three hour bus, 
Two bungy jumps, 
And a Kiwi in a pine tree.

On the twelfth day of Christmas, 
my true love sent to me 
Twelve Skype calls, 
Eleven sunny hours, 
Ten Christmas parcels, 
Nine crazy kids, 
Eight Kiwi Pies, 
Seven sleeping mates, 
Six dusky dolphins, 
Five penguins, 
Four Cadbury Fountains, 
Three hour bus, 
Two bungy jumps, 
And a Kiwi in a pine tree!

Some more Paragliding

Jam packed

So fo the last few days we have been just chilling in queenstown and not doing too much really. It was nice to have 4 days there just to relax meet some people before moving on again. The first at we just wandered around all the shops in the town and just had a good look about the place to see what was happening. It's a cool enough town right beside Lake Wakitipu which is pretty damn big and over 400m deep too. The nxt day then we done a walk right up to the top of the gondola, it's the highest point around queenstown and only took about 2 hours to get up there so it wasn't bad at all. The views up there were super, with a 360 view of the lake, the town and the remarkables rising towards the sky. It's pretty nice, then we jumped on the gondola back down and were down in less than 5mins which was handy. Ten since all the boring enough stuff was done, (boring by queenstown standards) it was time to get cracking on why adrenaline pumping stuff we were going to do. We thought about it alot, although the outcome was quite inevitable really, it was time to jump out of a cable car 150m above perfectly good ground and freefall for 134m. Then bith of us were doing the Nevis Arc, the worlds highest swing with a freefall of 70m and an arc of 300m through a valley. Both were epic for different reasons, the bungy jump I just pure fear conquring stuff while the arc is alot of fun. The bungy is pretty cool, there is no time for fear except for the last second after the 3-2-1-jump! when you have to dive into nothing but free air. The ground rush is spectacular with the valley floor almost tipping ur fingers as you reach the climax of ur all. Simply breathtaking but worth every single penny. Then the arc is just fun, a massive swing through the valley, plus now after doing it, it has made Alv want to do a bungy! So then to top that day off we went and got out final Fergburger of the trip to queenstown. Think Alv is liking burgers too. What an amazing time there. So then we caught our bus out if there, all the way across to Dunedin on the east coast. Only took 4 hours to cross the entire country which was a bit mad really. We manged yo get to our hostel before we both passed out. The wether here has actually been pretty changable compared to eerywhere else in the country. Dunedin means Edinburgh apparently and you can see why when you see the weather, grey skies and a chilly chilly wind. It's a real nice place though, some real nice buildings and spots around the city to chill. But it also has some amzing things including the worlds smallest penguins, sealions and the Cadbury Factory. So yesterday we caught a bus out to the Otago peninsula only 30 mins from the city centre. It's a really nice place out there and is home to some of the rarest wildlife in New Zealand. We walked for 2 from the bus stop to a place called Allan beach reserve where we stayed for awhile. We seen about 8 of the worlds smallest penguin, the blue penguin. They were beautiful animals. They were all hiding under rocks out of the way so they wouldn't be disturbed so we didn't disturb them. Then we got caught in a dodgy situation as a 400kg male sealion appeared out of the sea right beside us as we were walking back along the beach. Luckily with all my bush experience I negotiated a way out of the situation while allowing him to pass by freely and us not get sat on. It was a really good experience out there and seen some beautiful animals in the wild. So then this morning, we all went to the Cadbury Factory, it was a chocolate wonderland full of chocolate, chocolate and even more chocolate too. It was a good enough tour too and we got tins of free bars to keep us going so we came out pretty happy i'd say. Well worth a visit to Cadbury World. But now it's bye bye to Dunedin and off up north to a place called Oamaru, the home of the worlds rarest penguin, the yellow-eyed penguin. So hopefully in the next day or 2 we will get to see one which will be awesome to top everything else off. It's so strange knowing it's only a week to Christmas coz in no way does it feel like it, wish it was cold and got the smell of Christmas pudding. Yum yum. Only 378 days until we get a proper Christmas dinner in cold cold Ireland.  

Ice ice baby

The time to get on the ice was here, but our stupid alarm never went off coz the iPhone died at some stage during the nite. Luckily though I woke up only 10mins after the alarm was supposed to so all was not lost, it was just a bit rushed to get to the hike centre but we made it. Didn't take too long either before we were fully geared up and ready to go. After about 5 mins on a bus we were there, in the glacier valley and it looked good. Then we started the walk, the hardest part was actually gettin to the ice cuz we had to cross 2km of rock. But once we donned our spikes and were on the ice it was easy going. The ice was awesome and looked sweet. There were caves and fissures everywhere exposing the deep blue ice from the depths of the glacier. It's mad actually, the glacier is about 180m thick and moves at about 20cm per day which is crazy fast for a piece of ice that big. So we spent about 5 hours on the ice itself going about 2/3 the way up it to the high valley where the ice walls were about 25m tall and were nothing but pure ice. It was a cool experience up there and luckily as soon ad we stepped onto the ice the skies clear and there was nothing but blue around, then once we stepped off it started to rain so we were pretty lucky with good weather for it. We got a free pass to the hot glacier pools too so we headed there in the evening. There was 3 pools, one at 36 degrees, one at 38 and another at 40 and my gid they were good. It was pure glacier water too which wa even nicer but they did the body good and heated us up so much after the day of ice. So we caught a bus outta there the next day and headed south to Wanaka. We crossed the biggest fault line in NZ too, between franz and fox glaciers, it was insane, a massive crevice cutting through the valley. Apparently the plates are colliding so much they created the southern alps and that the next earthquake is long overdue, over 1000 years in fact so the reckon when it happens it's goin to split the south island in 2. We made it to Wanaka without the quake happening which was a relief but unfortunately the rainy weather from franz had beat us to Wanaka so it was the best of days when we got here. But we really wanted to do paragliding here before we left so we waited to book it until this morning. I woke early and peeked out the window to be blinded by sun and blue skies. Up we got and within 40mins we were on the bus up a mountain to jump off it soon. The drive was stunning, passing the lake and getting the views if the mountains all around us. We were flying from 1100m above ground level, half way up Treble cone. When we got up there the view wa spectacular. Just amzing like. It was time to get our gear on, helmet-check, gloves-check, harness-check, pilot-check, wings- check, then simply run! Ground is gone and were 1100m in the sky. Simple. Neither if us had any fear and didn't even think anything of jumping off a perfectly good cliff into the sky. Then it was pure air. Flying above the kestrels and hawks below and just winding around the mountain side. It was so nice up there. It was over way too soon though and as soon as we landed we both wanted to do it again. Amazing. So then this afternoon we caught another bus, only just over an hour, in Queenstown, the land of the fearless. First stop on the agenda was the Mecca that is the lengendary Fergburger. The biggest and best burgers in the world. It was sublime. That's the only way to describe it. Every backpacker in the country knows of it and it has been the most recommended place in the whole country, eveyine and I mean everyone tells everyone to go because it's just that good, though, eat 2 and death is certain. 

A walk in the park

So from kaikoura and whale watching we headed up further north out past nelson to the Abel Tasman national park. It's the only one of NZ's national parks that's Coastal so we were expecting good things from it. We got up there real early, we literally dropped our bags and stuffed food into our bags for the day and then we headed into the park. We walked for a good 9hrs in total and made it a third if the way through the park which wasn't bad goin at all. It was a spectacular walk and even though it was so long we were constantly distracted by the tourquoise waters and white sands that were around every corner. It was a pretty nice day too, wasn't too hot so was perfect for walking. For lunch we found a track that lead up to the top of a hill which had 360 views of the entire coastline, so we sat there for at least an hour or so just in pure awe of the place. But we had to walk back so we had to get moving on. On the way back though we stopped off at a little bay and went got a swim in what we thought was goin to be the warm Tasman sea but it was freezing in there. We lasted about 5 mins in the water before our toes looked like they were goin to fall off. It was worth it though so can't complain I suppose. So on the first day we walked over 23km along the track which is pretty damn good. The next day we had booked an aquataxi along the coast. So we got brought the length of the park and seen what we didn't see the day before yesterday, would have been a slice of paradise but it was lashing rain. But it didn't dampen out spirits and off we went see the beautiful bays and coves all along the park before getting dropped off at a beach where we then started a 4hr walk to our pick up point. It turned out ok cuz the rain stopped and it was nice enough to walk in but could have been better. So we made our pick up and then it was the boat trip back to the mainland, bit rough to say the least with massive storm swells crashing against us all the time, but we did get to see a blue penguin, the smallest penguin in the world too which was a pretty nice thing to top off the trip to the park. So that eveing it was onto a bus back to nelson where we stayed for the nite in a nice hostel alled Paradiso with free wifi and the lot so wasn't too bad. Then today we caught our bus down to glacier town. It was a pretty cool bus trip, we got to stop off at a place called Punakaiki where there are amzing rock formations and blowholes. So we went for a walk around there and we were pretty lucky as tide was coming in and a blowhole was starting to blow. Neither of us had ever seen one so that in itself was an experience. So from there we arrived here in Franz Josef glacier town. It's a nice place but there's not too many people around which is a good enough thing too. So we booked our hike up the glacier for in the morning but just hope the weather clears a but for us tomorrow. 

AJ Hackett Day

Flying High

Hiking on Franz Josef

Pancake rocks

Abel Tasman Park